Jim Clark took center stage at the 2025 Goodwood Revival, with a moving tribute from Jackie Stewart and spectacular memories
Three-time Formula 1 world champion John Young “Jackie” Stewart paid a moving tribute to Jim Clark, who died in a fatal accident in 1968, at the 2025 Goodwood Revival.
Stewart said: “Jim was a wonderful friend. For both of us as Scots, it was something completely new at the time to drive in Formula 1, but Jim was a very, very good friend to [my wife] Helen and me.”
“Throughout his career, he was the cleanest, best driver I ever dealt with. We shared an apartment in London that John Whitmore had given us, and Jim and I spent a lot of time together there. That’s why I still get emotional when I think about it today,” said Stewart—then his voice faltered.
Sheep on the Goodwood race track
This year’s Goodwood Revival at the Goodwood Motor Circuit in England was dedicated to Clark, who won his second Formula 1 world championship title 60 years ago.
To celebrate the two-time world champion, 50 sheep were let onto the track—a nod to Clark’s humble beginnings in Fife, Scotland, where he grew up as the son of a sheep farmer.
In addition, more than 30 vehicles related to Clark and his career took to the track, including the Lotus 25, in which Clark became world champion for the first time in 1963, and the Lotus 38, in which Clark won the Indianapolis 500 in 1965.
During his Formula 1 career from 1960 to 1968, Clark achieved a total of 25 Grand Prix victories, 32 podium finishes, 33 pole positions, and 28 fastest laps. Together with Stewart, he also set the lap record at the Goodwood Motor Circuit in 1965, which still stands today.
That’s why Charles Gordon-Lennox, Duke of Richmond and resident of Goodwood, considered it “a great privilege to honor Jim Clark at this year’s Goodwood Revival.” Gordon-Lennox continued: “Clark’s achievements in the 1965 season are legendary: he won both the Formula 1 World Championship and the Indy 500.”
And Clark remained fast: after finishing sixth in the drivers’ championship in 1966 and third in 1967, he made another attempt to win the Formula 1 world title in 1968 – and started the season as the leader in the standings with a victory at the South African Grand Prix. A few weeks later, Clark died in a serious accident in a Formula 2 race in Hockenheim at the age of 32.